Episode101
Dragon-Breath Blowback Plan We picked things up deep in Yaw's left sinus, (no pun intended). The threat of the sneeze had passed, but a new one was brewing. We were poised to move deeper into Yaw's cranium, but one of the big crystal wall/openings, (Flesh Portcullises!), had slammed shut in front of us again. We waffled a little bit but Oz, (thinking that he had figured out the Flesh Portcullis' Open / Closing pattern), reminded everyone it was due to open imminently so stay patient. There was a tense moment when it didn't open on its assumed 'Schedule', but a Segment later it opened again and we were able to move through. Since he could move much faster than the slowest members of our Party Kiwi scouted ahead, (dropping Location spells periodically). Our hope was to reach the far end of the sinus passage before the Dragon Scale protective bubble that was keeping the multitudes of SkittR Drones from annihilating us expired. Things were going pretty well until all of the crystal openings slammed shut in front of the group again, this time separating us from Kiwi! It was about this time that Oz started having trouble maintaining the Dragon Scale's protective bubble. Spending two more Bennies was only going to buy us a few more segments. Worse yet, the Flesh Portcullises did not respond to the Scale of Passing. Feeling a good deal of urgency, Oz struck out at the one in front of us with a solid attack, but it wasn't enough. He and Joe tried again, (this time boosted with Light Nanites), but it still was far out of reach (munchkin math: it was somewhere around AC:200. Who knows what the RF was!). Clearly we needed a new plan. Unable to make even the slightest dent in the blockage before us, the new plan turned out to involve just waiting for it to open of its own accord, (this time taking even longer however). Thankfully, the wall eventually retracted, allowing us to fall back to a handy Portal that Kiwi had raised in his characteristically, 'instant' fashion. The Portal took us to one of two fleshy ensphinctered orifices at the other end of the sinus, adjacent to a turn-off that was emitting a crackling glow, which we suspected led to some kind of igniter for the Dragon's Breath Weapon? We stepped through together, all following Oz with the Scale of Passage's protection. Just then Oz was struck by another vision,(as soon as he neared the sphincter). He realized that he was seeing the chamber immediately on the other side of one of the sphincters, within which were a half dozen or so Reaver's; mostly upgraded Queens protecting a Reaver Devourer! The Devourer appeared to be a beautiful woman attached to a monstrous Reaver device embroiled in some kind of nasty Reaver ritual. His vision also revealed that Yaw's nasty 'dark orb' was in there, and was of course intimately involved in the ritual in some way. A Reaver Lore revealed that the ritual was some kind of backup plan for Yaw that would kick-in if he failed to defeat us! It also revealed that all of these Reavers had been upgraded far beyond the Queen we had fought at the end of chapter 2. The chamber had two exits beyond the Reavers, but entering it would entail a fight of epic proportions. One that we probably did not want to start right now? Oz warned the party of what he'd saw and recommended that we try a different way. We debated strenuously over whether the Ritual could be left to interrupt by defeating Yaw and destroying all of the Reavers with the Cleansing Prism, but based on Oz's reading of the situation we figured that we had better stop it before proceeding further. Also of concern was the fact that all of our Science: Dragon-God Biology checks seemed to indicate that the super dragon was preparing to unleash its terrible Breath Weapon. Given that the sneeze that we had avoided with OJ's Stasis Bubble had probably blasted the rest of the Assault Wing back out into space, the prospect of the imminent fiery engulfment did not bode well for the fleet! It was at this point that Pete had the brainwave to kill 2 Birds with one Stone; we could try to disrupt the imminent breath weapon by overloading the Igniter, and then redirect the blast into the ritual chamber, (which sounded awesome). We debated a few approaches, but needed to learn more about how the breath weapon igniter worked before we could come to any substantial conclusions, so Kiwi raced ahead to investigate the igniter chamber with the rest of us following at 'follower speed'. On the way, Oz struggled with the need to expend all of his remaining Bennies to maintain the rapidly faltering protective bubble. It was a hard choice since likely the bubble would be stronger later while everything was open prior to the unleashing of the breath weapon, but looking at the faces of our brave followers desperately fighting to survive in a hazardous environment far above their less-than-third-tier abilities he ultimately had no choice at all. Thankfully, Kiwi had donated a Benny earlier, so Oz had enough to renew the Bubble one more time despite a heavy cost, (three Bennies, two of them Arbiter Bennies). We had bought ourselves a little more time! Kiwi's scouting had revealed that the SkitR drones did not extend much further down the passage leading the Igniter chamber, so we headed toward it. However, on the way Oz took the opportunity to open our apparent route forward, (the other Sphincter that opened into the sinus cavity), to see what was on the other side. It was a risky move, but we needed to know what lay ahead before the dragon breath hit us. Peering in revealed that beyond the orifice was a long empty corridor that lead, (hopefully?), to Yaw's eye. But was it empty? No, it wasn't. Those sneaky Reavers were hiding in droves, but an epic perception check (300+) revealed their presence. Quickly moving away, we closed the Orifice and hurried toward the breath weapon igniter chamber and took refuge from the SkitRs. The Igniter chamber was very long with some kind of large electrical structure at the end. The tech monkeys debated some super interesting stuff and came up with a theory on how to trigger a premature ignition that would immolate the local area while also disabling the dragon breath before the blast could be directed outside, (or at least one nostril's worth, anyway). We would need to simultaneously close the last Flesh Portcullis, (by triggering an autonomic reflex response with an overloaded level 30 E-Cell of Joe's), overload the igniter, (using a Quantum Tachyon Burst from Oros' Trans-Dimensional Array?), and open the Sphincter leading to the Ritual Chamber while closing the one that leads to the Optic Nerve, (ideally with us on the non-immolatey side of it). Pete's original plan to operate the Sphincters from a safe distance involved blowing his wad of 6 Bennies on the Scale of Passage (assuming that it would even work since Dragons are particular about who they talk to) to boost its range, but since we ran out of time before we got to that portion of the plan, (and the Bennies re-set between Episodes), we may need to come up with a work around for that part next time? None the less, if we can pull it off then we might be able to blast the ritual, clear our route ahead, and lessen the power of the breath weapon about to hit our fleet floundering in the aftermath of the big sneeze all at once! Also, we may be able to clear our exit path as well if we open both orifices. It's worth considering since that passage was teeming with Reavers. That's the plan and also where we called it for the night at the end of the round. Back to Space Junk Log Category:Space Junk